Are Henckels Kitchen knives worth the $$$

B

Bob Litt

Joined
Feb 7, 1999
Messages
94
I'm looking into a set of professional kitchen cutlery. I've often seen chefs using Henckels knives. Are those knives really that good in terms of quality, or can I find something better at the same price range?

Also, Has anyone heard of Global kitchen knives? Global knives looks asthetically appealing. The entire knife, from blade to handel, is made entirely of stainless steel. They are made in Japan and their prices are some what higher than Henckels. They look great, but I not certain about the quality. Here's a link to a site that advertise global knives: http://www.eurokitchens.com/global.htm

Thanks for any comments or suggestions?

Thanks in advance for any comments.

[This message has been edited by Bob Litt (edited 10-10-2000).]
 
We bought a three piece set for an anniversary six years ago -- big French chef's knife (8"), smaller and thinner chef's knife and paring knife, and love them. These have the dishwasher safe handles. These are not drop forged, at least in the traditional stamp 'em out of one piece of metal, but are supposed to be forged via some sintered or powdered metal technique which is supposed to be harder at the edge, stronger at the back. They hold a good edge, even with my wife's regular abuse. There may be better knives, but these are a heck of a lot better than the usual kitchen knife junk. My treasure, though, is an old, much blackened, carbon steel French chef's knife that I reserve for special occasions. My wife doesn't use that one.
 
At our house, we use Henckels for most stuff. Sometimes we use Cutco for steak knives, and the Henckels surpass the Cutco in quality easily. They take an edge easily with my Edge Pro (my mom is beginning to appreciate my hobbies finally after I sharpened all the Henckels for her).

------------------
Chang the Asian Janitorial Apparatus
 
We have a set of 4 star Henckels that has served us well for almost 15 years. At full retail price you can do better with some other brands like Wustoff Trident or Global which has had a lot of good reviews, but Henckels and Forschner (speling ?) seem to be the most popular. I think that we got ours for about 1/2 price, which was a good deal.

Get a polished F. Dick steel to use the knives, as it's much better than the coarse steel that comes with sets. Also, I find that a thin carbon steel knife still seems to be handy to have around, as they can do things like trim fat better.
 
I don't think Henkels are worth the money. I have a few Tramontina Professionals I got at Walmart for $14 for and 4" paring and $17 for a 6" utility. They work great, have very good edge holding and can be restored to hair popping sharpness with a strop. Haven't fully sharpened them since late august and have neen used regulary at college, with only a weekly stropping. Great starter knives for a low budget and perform well. They were ranked 5th by Consumer Reports, behind the 2 Wustolph's and 2 Henkels, for 1/3 the price. Great buy and for the money, can't be beat. Get these and save your money for a good custom set of the knives you want. They will deliver years of use! I have sharpened Henkels for other people and used them a bit to try the edges, and I like my tramontina's better. Slightly thinner and lots less expensive make the tramontina's a great deal. Find them at Wal Mart or online. Get the professional series that look like the Wustolph's and HenkelS with the triple riveted black handle.
 
Bob- www.tichbourneknives.com Check out George's line of kitchen knives. Nothing compares to using a custom, even for mundane kitchen chores.
smile.gif
 
Henckels are good knives but just make sure you're getting "Two-Man" not "One-Man". If you look at the blade you'll see either one or two men on the logo. The "One-Man" blades are thinner stock and made in Brazil and Spain. The "Two-Man" are thicker stock and made in Germany.

Two other good choices (I use them both) are Sabatier knives from France and Grohmann knives from Pictou Nova Scotia, Canada. The Grohmann don't have the fit and finish to match the Sabatiers, but they are very comfortable and take a suberb edge. Hope this helps.
 
IMHO, not even close! Buy the Spyderco or Forschner kitchen knives. You'll save a ton of money AND get much better knives to boot! Both of these brands have better steel than Henckels... stays sharper longer, easier to resharpen, etc.

We tried Henckels and ended up switching. YMMV.

AJ
 
In our kitchen we have Wusthof, Sabatier, Global and Henckels. Of all these brands the Henckels are my least favourites. The others hold an edge better and especially the four star Sabatiers (made by Thiers Isaard in France) have better fit and finish. If I were buying just one brand I would go with the Sabatier since they are less expensive than the others and hold an edge better than henckels and about equal to the others (although I much prefer the deeper blade of the Wusthof chefs knife). I don't use the global too much since I really don't like the way the handle fits my hand but the global blade easily outperforms the henckel. As Alberta Ed states I also have some antique carbon steel kitchen knives and they are nifty knives since they are much easier to resharpen but hold a comparable edge. You do have to take good care of them though.
 
I have two Henckel Chef knives each over 20 yrs old that are great knives and the non stainless carbon steel one is admired buy the Chefs teaching the culinary classes I'm taking. The Chefs that teach in this culinary degree program and I concur, recommend the higher quality German or Japanese cutlery, looking for what feels/fits best. I like the Messermeister chefs knives. For a good selection and prices check out www.knifemerchant.com
Jerry
 
My Mom was a chef for most of her life so we always had top quality knives in the kitchen, including Henckels. She was so disappointed with the Henckels that she eventually gave them away. She believes that Forschner are the best and that is what she uses to this day. I used all of those knives over the years and have to agree. In my kitchen we still use Forschner. They hold a good edge, are easy to sharpen and can be purchased for substantially less than Henckels.

Fox
 
I just went thru this process on which kitchen knives to buy. Listen to the guys that are recommending the Forschners. I just got mine and they are bang for the $. They will do the job and at much less $. Good luck.
 
Henckels have the best name recognition. Not because they're the best, but because they spent the most money and marketed themselves more aggressively. The steel is soft.....too soft to hold a decent edge IMO. I spent a year trying to keep my old room mate's set of high end Henckels sharp. A decent edge never lasted more than a couple of days.

Now that I have a nice collection of Spyderco kitchen knives, I'm amazed at how good they are for the money. The handles are a little on the cheap side, but I can hack up a few chickens with the chef's knife and still shave hair. Of course, I'm always careful to cut on a soft plastic or wood cutting board.

Henckels do make a nice gift for people who don't know better. They're impressed by the name.

I will be rehandling some Spyderco kitchen knives in the next few months. I'll post pictures of what happens.
 
Last Christmas I wanted to get a set of kitchen knives for the wife. After asking about kitchen knives and contacting James Mattis I ended up getting the wifey poo a Spyderco kitchen set that James put togeather for her. He put togeather a excellent set of knives that we really enjoy. Now everytime I use them I'm always reminded of James.

For my money nothing can beat Spyderco kitchen knives
biggrin.gif
biggrin.gif
 
Maybe it's because Henckels are so well known and they've been around awhile, but there sure are a lot of conflicting statements about hardness. Specs that I've seen on the hardness of their 4 star knives rate them RC56 thru RC58 depending upon the knife, and some in this newsgroup have complained that they're too hard and make sharpening difficult. It seems that lately people are saying that they're too soft, and that the Victorinox Forschner are much better. We use some of the Victorinox paring knives as they are inexpensive and slice well due to being so thin, but they are noticeably softer than the Henckels and need to be touched up more often.

While it gets used typically a few times each day, my wife broke one of the Victorinox knives a couple of days ago. It snapped off at the handle, which is where one would expect the stress to be concentrated. We've had it maybe three years or so, and while it broke it's no big deal as it was only about $5.

My favorite kitchen knives currently are some odds and ends; a carbon steel Windmill paring knife by Herder that is only 0.04in thick, a couple of carbon steel Nogent paring knives by Thiers Isaard, and a 10in carbon steel Wustoff Trident chefs knife that I recently picked at an antique store for $12. I'm looking at more of the Thiers Isaard knives as the carbon steel seems a bit harder than some of the others that I've used, but I'll probably go with the full tang versions in the larger knives. Some of the Japanese blue steel knives look attractive too, but I'd want to handle one first before buying.

Kitchen knives are fun because you use them so often.
 
While I'm sure the high quality German and Japanese kitchen knives will serve you well, I happen to prefer the high quality Canadian kitchen knives
smile.gif
smile.gif
. Please reread Mr. Rosvall's post above and then visit George Tichbourne's Web site. You could probably choose three knives from his extensive offering that will do just about anything that needs doing in a kitchen. Your only concern at that point becomes who to leave them to in your will after you've gotten decades of use out of them
smile.gif
.

------------------
Semper Fi

-Bill
 
Let me add I have purchased a Forschner set (boning, paring and 10" chefs)for my daughter and a boning and paring knives for myself because they are the least exspensive of the knives recommended for the culinary classes were taking. I have used all these knives and they work fine however I find the paring way to light for my taste. Jerry
 
Judging from the performance I've seen from the Victorinox stuff, it's even softer than the Henckels stuff.

Henckels too hard to sharpen well?
smile.gif
I wish.

Before I really got into knives, alot of guys told me that Buck knives were too hard and that they were hard to sharpen. Once I learned how to sharpen and started to compare the performance of different knives, I found that Buck knives were not all that hard nor were they hard to sharpen. They just didn't do a good job of holding an edge (in my experience). Just an example of how different people "experience" different things.

I don't have it in for Henckels really. They have good ergonomics and they're functional. I just wish that they used a harder steel, even if it stained a little. They're meant to look great in a knife block and to stay shiny, not to be the best cutting implement out there. They're decent enough, but the higher end stuff is way too expensive for the level of performance.

Sal Glesser of Spyderco mentioned that they might be coming out with a line of nicer kitchen knives. Now that's something that would be worth having in the kitchen! MBS-26 is a nice steel with great edge-holding. It does stain a little, but we're not talking about art knives here.....
 
For those who have taken the time to visit my site Carol has made a change in our web site to include a review of my kitchen knives by the Canadian Federation of Chefs and Cooks.

On the hardness aspect of kitchen knives there are two schools of thought. The first is that if you make them soft they will be easy to sharpen but they will dull quicker than a harder knife. The second is make the knife hard but not brittle, it will be a little harder to sharpen but won't need sharpening as frequently and will last longer. My kitchen knives at Rc 56-58 usually require sharpening only once or twice a year to maintain a razor edge. Most customers sharpen only once per year.

My personal preferance is for a large handled knife that fills my hand without squeezing, small handles cause my old hands to fatigue quickly.


------------------
george
www.tichbourneknives.com
sales@tichbourneknives.com




[This message has been edited by george tichbourne (edited 10-11-2000).]
 
I sure wish I could handle some of these Custom Kitchen knives I can't bring myself to part with the bucks required with only seeing a photo. Hopefully some will be at Solvang 2001.
Bob: If you like Global take a look at Furi.
Jerry
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top